Slashdot is powered by your submissions, so send in your scoop

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×
Businesses

Whole Foods To Cut Health-Care Benefits For 1,900 Part-Time Employees Starting Next Year (cnbc.com) 114

Amazon-owned Whole Foods will be withdrawing medical benefits for hundreds of its part-time workers starting Jan. 1, 2020, the company said Thursday. From a report: In the past, employees needed to work at least 20 hours a week to buy into the health-care plan. Now they will need to work at least 30 hours. Less than 2% of its workforce, or 1,900 employees, will no longer be eligible for medical coverage, under the new policy, the company said.

"In order to better meet the needs of our business and create a more equitable and efficient scheduling model, we are moving to a single-tier part-time structure," a company spokesperson said in an email. "We are providing Team Members with resources to find alternative healthcare coverage options, or to explore full-time, healthcare-eligible positions starting at 30 hours per week. All Whole Foods Market Team Members continue to receive employment benefits including a 20% in-store discount."

This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.

Whole Foods To Cut Health-Care Benefits For 1,900 Part-Time Employees Starting Next Year

Comments Filter:
  • by Anonymous Coward

    They should already be healthy. They don't need health care. That's for sick people.

    • by bobstreo ( 1320787 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @04:42PM (#59192008)

      They should already be healthy. They don't need health care. That's for sick people.

      LOL, have you ever seen the walking dead that work in health food stores?

      It's probably just some MBA realizing how much they are spending on Health Care costs. This seems pretty typical when vast faceless companies take over well run companies that actually care about their employees.

      I would also guess it's probably going to impact more than 1900 people,

      • "I would also guess it's probably going to impact more than 1900 people,"

        And if I had to guess, those affected are going to be much worse off than the average employee. If they're working part time at Whole Foods, they're likely working several other part time jobs. And I'm sure the insurance isn't particularly good or cheap, so those who are actually buying into it really need it. I'm assuming we're going to be hearing a lot of stories of bankruptcies triggered by this plus the costs of cancer treatment fo

        • And if I had to guess, those affected are going to be much worse off than the average employee. If they're working part time at Whole Foods, they're likely working several other part time jobs.

          Well, why don't they just get full time jobs, if not at WF, somewhere else?

          Or if nothing else, if they want to remain part time, then just up their hours from 20 to 30.

          They're still paying for partners that work 30 hours.....

          Hell, I've never seen a company provide health or other full time level benefits to part

          • And why don't they just eat cake, if not from WF, somewhere else?

            • Most part-timers are either young and still on their parents' health insurance, or 2nd earners who can be included on their spouses plan.

              When my company switched from 100% company funded insurance, to 80% coverage (with the employee paying 20%) nearly half of the under-25 employees cancelled their coverage. They were covered elsewhere, or just didn't expect to get sick.

              Amazon was being overly generous to people that mostly didn't need or appreciate it.

              If they want to improve retention of part-timers, they

              • "Amazon was being overly generous to people that mostly didn't need or appreciate it."

                Goddamned proles getting uppity! They should be thankful for the pittance we give them. Thankful they are _allowed_ to stock shelves with preposterously expensive food for the rich. If these subhuman peons don't shut up, we'll have to send in the deathbots!

              • by novakyu ( 636495 )

                Amazon was being overly generous to people that mostly didn't need or appreciate it.

                If that's true, Amazon can easily save money by running their own insurance (in fact, many large companies do do this, paying an insurance company only for administration of insurance, not actual risk-shifting part of insurance). After all, in the self-insured scheme, the insurer (in this case, Amazon itself) doesn't actually pay anything extra for people who are covered and don't use the insurance.

                Since they aren't doing th

              • Most part-timers are either young and still on their parents' health insurance, or 2nd earners who can be included on their spouses plan.

                When my company switched from 100% company funded insurance, to 80% coverage (with the employee paying 20%) nearly half of the under-25 employees cancelled their coverage. They were covered elsewhere, or just didn't expect to get sick.

                Amazon was being overly generous to people that mostly didn't need or appreciate it.

                If they want to improve retention of part-timers, they should raise their pay instead. Everybody appreciates that.

                Yes, the ACA says that they can stay on their parents' plan until 26, so that made sense. But the current administration is trying as hard as it can to end that.

          • 30 hours legally counts as 'full time' in many jurisdictions, so 20 hours was them being generous... giving benefits at 30 is them complying with the law.

      • LOL, have you ever seen the walking dead that work in health food stores?

        The last time I was in a Whole Foods store in scenic Austin, Texas the employees were extremely friendly and helpful.

        When I asked for the best pickles they had, they steered me to the best stuff . . . I usually try to buy Claussen pickles in the US, but not every supermarket has them. The Whole Foods things were even better.

        When at the checkout, I packed the checked items into my backpack. The clerk was confused, but said that I would get a discount for not demanding "paper or plastic".

        When I told him

        • Sounds like a cult.

          • Sounds like a cult.

            Like definitely, dude!

            In normal churches, you get a bad tasting biscuit with grape juice during the church service.

            In Whole Foods churches . . . you get pickles cured in LSD, and served with cannabis bread and Absinthe!

            If you eat a couple of of them, you are like totally into their program.

            And you like totally know it.

            But you are flying so high fly, that you don't give a damn.

      • Of course it will.

        First they remove health benefits if you're not working 30 hours, then they hire more people to work part time, but only less than 30 hours. Then existing employees suddenly find it impossible to get scheduled for 30 hours.

        Oldest play in the book.

    • They should already be healthy. They don't need health care. That's for sick people.

      Now that these part-time employees won't be eligible for employee-sponsored insurance, they'll have to buy, probably more expensive if they don't qualify for subsidies, insurance on the Marketplace. [And, of course, your joking aside, insurance is for if/when you get sick and/or injured, not because you're presently healthy.]

      All Whole Foods Market Team Members continue to receive employment benefits including a 20% in-store discount."

      Even *with* the discount, they'll probably have to switch to Half Foods.

      Fun fact: My insurance premium on the Marketplace is $730/month because I make a little too much to qualify f

      • All Whole Foods Market Team Members continue to receive employment benefits including a 20% in-store discount."

        Even *with* the discount, they'll probably have to switch to Half Foods.

        I think you just started a meme. Oh wait, never mind. [youtube.com]

      • by rjnagle ( 122374 )

        Fun fact: My insurance premium on the Marketplace is $730/month because I make a little too much to qualify for subsidies. If I made $1 less than the subsidy cut-off, my premium would be $52/month.

        This sounds like b.s. One bedrock of the ACA program is setting premiums to no more than 10% of income. You qualify for subsidies on a sliding scale, so this kind of drop is impossible. If your monthly premiums are 730 per month, then your income is probably at least 7300 per month.

        The fact that this commenter's income is so high explains his/her misunderstanding of the plight of Whole Foods workers as well. Most of these workers are on the low end of income; qualifying for subsidies will be no problem --

        • This sounds like b.s. One bedrock of the ACA program is setting premiums to no more than 10% of income. You qualify for subsidies on a sliding scale, so this kind of drop is impossible. If your monthly premiums are 730 per month, then your income is probably at least 7300 per month.

          Sorry, but the reply from "Some Guy I Dont Know" (below) is correct and you're partially misinformed. There is a sliding scale, but it stops at 400% of the poverty level, which is about $48,500 for an individual. I make a little more than that and pay the FULL premium of $730/month. Running the numbers on the Healthcare.gov site at $1 less than the cutoff shows I would pay $52/month. There is a premium as percentage of income limit of 9.78% to avoid paying the penalty, which is no longer enforced, if yo

  • by Tablizer ( 95088 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @04:43PM (#59192014) Journal

    So now they are only Half Foods?

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @04:45PM (#59192016)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Obamacare is going away as soon as the 2020 elections deliver a GOP majority back into the House.
      • Doubtful, even *IF* the GOP reclaims a House majority, which is itself doubtful.
        • Re:Not a problem (Score:5, Interesting)

          by RightSaidFred99 ( 874576 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @05:23PM (#59192132)
          Lol, I'd say it's not doubtful - it won't happen. Grandparent post has absolutely 0 fingers on the pulse of American politics. We're at more danger of Democrats taking the Senate and Executive, which would be an unmitigated fucking disaster. We really seem to do best with a split congress and a Democrat President.
      • Curious. How did you get on slashdot from your alternate universe?

    • I'm a pretty right wing dude on many things, but I agree we need a better health care solution. As I like to say, every "anti-soshlism" right winger is a rugged individualist until they are bleeding out of their asshole and they can't afford medical care.

      The solution is not "free healthcare", nor is it what we have now. It's guaranteed healthcare where you pay $X of your own bills where $X scales with income from 0 to, say, $50k if you are a multimillionaire. Guaranteed for all, no bankruptcy risk. This wa

      • Re:Not a problem (Score:5, Interesting)

        by jwymanm ( 627857 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @05:39PM (#59192186) Homepage
        Everyone likes to talk about insurance coverage but does anyone talk about affording medical expenses even WITH coverage? I don't go to the doctor yet I have full insurance because the deductible and payments set me back enough where it hurts the piggy bank. My bills are pretty high so I unfortunately don't have a choice in this matter other than earn more money. I feel like that is the same for most of us even with insurance. Heaven help you if you are without insurance, I feel for you. But also heaven help you if you find yourself sick and you got to use your insurance!
        • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Calvin-X ( 120844 )

          Yeah, I just experienced this recently, as my company's healthcare coverage has been getting worse and worse over the past years. I went in for physical therapy, recommended by my PCP, and it was 100 bucks. It used to be the usual co-pay.

          But, even worse was finally processing, in my head, what they meant when you hear about unexpected fees. To think that someone gets dinged because they went to their provider to deliver a baby, but the provider used an outsider for anesthesia. Just seems shady. Like if

      • The solution is not "free healthcare"

        Of course, noone does "free healthcare". They do "government paid healthcare". Remember, the government gets its money from somewhere.

        That said, your proposal is essentially the same thing. Myself, I'm in favour of axing Medicaid (folding the money into Medicare), and then extend Medicare to everyone 18 and under (or 21 and under, if the numbers work), then begin lowering the age of eligibility by 2-5 years every year that passes.

        Which will transition us to single-p

        • I'm fine with single payer, it's what I proposed. But there's this idea that you shouldn't pay for the most important thing there is, your healthcare. People bitch about spending $100 here or there on healthcare then go blow $1k on an iphone.

          Single payer is great, but make people pay appropriately. Say up to 10% of their income on a sliding scale (0% if you're dirt poor, 5% if you're poorish, 10% on up). If you don't use the services because you make healthier choices and are lucky then great, you have a r

          • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

            by apoc.famine ( 621563 )

            You're still making it more complicated than it needs to be. $0 for anyone, for anything, any time. Then adjust taxes as needed.

            The amount of waste in medical billing and trying to do all this complicated insurance, deductible, co-pay shit is insane. We're paying tens of thousands of people to look up numbers and play accountant and make decisions of what qualifies and what doesn't. We're paying them to harass people who can't figure out how much they paid for what, and to go back and forth with people tryi

            • Re:Not a problem (Score:4, Interesting)

              by RightSaidFred99 ( 874576 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @10:32PM (#59192916)
              Easy. If you pay nothing you don't value it. Sore throat? It's free I will head to the doctor! Fat? Meh, won't cost me a dime. Medical care should cost you money personally or people will abuse and waste it.
              • Hello visitor from afar. Welcome to earth. Let me introduce you to hu-mons and the way they actually behave or think.

                Fat? Meh, won't cost me a dime.

                This. What. I don't even. How do... i mean. What.

                I challenge you to find me even one person (yeah I'm tempting fate the internet is large and full of crazies, but nonetheless) who has made the decision to be or even stay fat because healthcare is free. I mean if that were the case, America would be thin and Europe would be full of obese people.

                Medical care sho

                • by chill ( 34294 )

                  Challenge accepted.

                  My grandmother, now deceased, once had heart surgery. For two decades after that, every time she had a little twinge at all she was off to the emergency room. The problem was, she had frequent panic attacks and woe betide the person who called them "panic" attacks.

                  Hospital emergency rooms prioritize patients based on need, not first-come-first-serve. She was always loudly berating the staff for slow service. It would be an hour or so before getting seen by anyone other than the original a

                  • Challenge accepted.

                    While your grandmother sounds like an... interesting person I don't think this matches what the OP was talking about, or my claim about it.

                    Her answer? "What do I care what it costs? I'm not paying for it. This is covered 100% by Medicare and my insurance."

                    I think there was something else going on too. I mean as you said, she had to wait in A&E (actually here, the triage nurse will send you home if it's a sufficiently inappropriate venue), for a long time and spent it berating the staf

                    • by chill ( 34294 )

                      I think there was something else going on too. I mean as you said, she had to wait in A&E (actually here, the triage nurse will send you home if it's a sufficiently inappropriate venue), for a long time and spent it berating the staff (a stressful wait too). That's something of a cost and I know that given two completely free options, A&E vs my local GP, I always choose the latter unless I'm unlucky enough to be bleeding profusely because seriously who the hell wants to wait in an A&E waiting room.

                      I could speculate why she preferred a high stress, long wait visit to A&E vs a convenient visit to a GP at a convenient time, but either way it doesn't really sound like a cost thing.

                      Yes, it was ego. You go to the ER for *emergencies*! OMG! Whereas making an appointment and going to the GP wasn't an emergency. She *insisted* these were not panic attacks and actual heart attacks. You don't go to your GP for a heart attack. (I got that lecture once, too.)

                      But she grew up during the depression, and for most things was as penny-pinching as they come. So any opportunity to get something "expensive" -- including a visit to the fancy hospital ER -- was jumped on. Then she could brag about it to

              • So your solution to some small subset of people abusing a service is to deny a large portion of the population access to the service? That's GENIUS!

                You also ignore a couple of rather important issues.

                1) People without health insurance go to the ER because they will get treatment there. That costs 10x what it costs to go see a normal doctor. For every 1 person we get going to a regular doctor instead of the ER when they are sick we can pay for 9 other people to go to the doctor.

                2) People already abuse the sy

                • I am denying no one access. I said it should cost you money, not that it should be prohibitively expensive. It should be based on income. In fact I would have a negative deductible for the very poor. They get $500 to spend on medical care, if they don't, they keep it - if they do then everything after that is free.

                  People already abuse the system only if they don't pay for it. If you are going to end up paying $200 to visit the ER, you won't go for your sore throat.

          • by rjnagle ( 122374 )

            I'm fine with single payer, it's what I proposed. But there's this idea that you shouldn't pay for the most important thing there is, your healthcare. People bitch about spending $100 here or there on healthcare then go blow $1k on an iphone.

            Single payer is great, but make people pay appropriately. Say up to 10% of their income on a sliding scale (0% if you're dirt poor, 5% if you're poorish, 10% on up). If you don't use the services because you make healthier choices and are lucky then great, you have a reason to do so because you save money. If not, you won't go bankrupt and will get care still.

            The current ACA system from the very state guarantees that premiums do not exceed approximately 10% of a person's income for a silver plan. This has always been true. Geez, I tire of having to explain this to people on the right.

            • Funny I am proposing a more comprehensive single payer type system with a sliding scale max out of pocket amount and you're ranting and raving about right wingers and the ACA. The ACA isn't as bad as people make out but it's pretty silly. What kind of liberal are you, bruh?
      • Re:Not a problem (Score:5, Insightful)

        by shilly ( 142940 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @06:48PM (#59192386)

        I wonder if you guys have any idea just how *weird* you all sound when you grapple for solutions to healthcare funding like this, to European ears. It's like hearing you grapple with what to do about gun deaths. It reminds me of nothing so much as an eruv: a complicated solution to a confected problem that was better avoided in the first place, but which is the only viable solution given the fervent beliefs of a chunk of your population.

        • Euro-peons are such condescending fucktards.

          I say, let's pull 100% of the US military out of Europe. Today. Let those pompous assclowns henceforth pay for their own national defense.

          Sure, while the Euros are arguing about what kind of gourmet cheese to issue to their troops (all ten of them), the Russians will probably roll in and take over. Good. I like the average Ruskie better than the average Euro-peon.

          • while the Euros are arguing about what kind of gourmet cheese to issue to their troops (all ten of them), the Russians will probably roll in and take over. Good. I like the average Ruskie better than the average Euro-peon.

            You, sir, are a perfect caricature. Well done!

          • by shilly ( 142940 )

            You know, I do worry, from time to time, about being condescending. But then I read a reply like yours -- where you are so spectacularly stupid that you use a condescending insult boy ("Euro-peon" -- such shining wit!) *in a complaint about people being condescending*. And I realise that, for people like you (by which I don't mean Americans, I mean incandescently, pointlessly angry rightwing fucktards spunk-drunk on jingoism), being condescending to is absolutely what you deserve.

      • Or, the USA could spent a little bit less on military, and then have universal healthcare. If you have no issues with socialism to pay for the military, then why the problem for healthcare ?
        • by novakyu ( 636495 )

          I agree. We should pull all our troops out of Western Europe and the rest of the world. Let these smug assholes defend themselves---and pay for their own defense.

          • Go for it. Then watch how US goods also get last place in ports for unloading, how US Airlines get put furthest away from the central hub. The USA is already loosing the trade war against China, just imagine how a trade war against the major trading nations will go. The USA is only 4% of the worlds population , the world makes up 96%. Yes the world will suffer, the US would be devastated.
      • The solution is not "free healthcare", nor is it what we have now.

        I live in the UK, we get healthcare that is "free at the point of delivery", but which we pay for through a national insurance system. I honestly can't think of a country in the world that has free healthcare in the sense that the population doesn't pay for it in any way.

    • by Firethorn ( 177587 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @05:28PM (#59192150) Homepage Journal

      but it's time we moved away from employer based healthcare anyway.

      This, 100%. Outside of a few special cases like professional sports or the military, employers shouldn't be providing health coverage in the first place. It became a benefit to attract workers when wages were capped during WWII, but I think it's actually horrible. The number of people I've met who were stuck in their position because they can't afford to lose their health insurance...

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by byronivs ( 1626319 )
        Yes! Put the tax breaks in Individuals pockets and remove them from the employers. The employers will drop coverage like a rock. And remember you don't get to choose your plan, but sometimes from but a handful offered by the company, if that. Some corps run their own insurance, most only contract with one plan. That's not choice. Plus, they can change on a whim annually so you can't necessarily keep your doctor. We also need to look at unions, because unless they also offer choice they are part of the probl
    • THe hope was that universal healthcare could sever the employer funded health insurance trap. Now people could move freely to new jobs or self employ without need to change their health care or lose it.

      When you consider that about 20% of families have someone with a pre-existing condition, restarting health care after a lapse was a problem. This ruled out periods of unemployment for most people making them very non-portable.

      Of course ACA being state-centric rather than national didn't fully solve that por

      • Obamacare was nothing like a national healthcare system. It was the government picking the pockets of workers and giving the money to for-profit insurance rackets. With a welfare program tossed in to make it more palatable.

        • This, 100%. When single payer isn't in the mix, and for-profit companies are the main drivers, you know it's not good for the consumer.

          The older I get the more I realize that the waste of a government bureaucracy is almost never higher than the incompetence and waste in a for-profit company. On one side you have a bunch of generally good-hearted people trying their best to get their job done in a political environment with an excess of checks and balances, and on the other side you have people trying to do

          • The older I get the more I realize that the waste of a government bureaucracy is almost never higher than the incompetence and waste in a for-profit company.

            I agree, strongly, and I think it's because they're all soylent green (made of people). There are also a few other things that people don't take into account.

            Humans are capable of organising things at scale, but it's always inefficient. There's nothing about companies that fix that nor governments that break it. It's all just humans.

            Organisation at sca

    • Individuals with ACA MAGIs of 300% to 400% of the federal poverty level are expected to contribute 9.86% of their premiums in 2019. Those earning 133% or less must contribute 2.08%.

      The trouble here is "individuals". The calculator is here. [healthinsurance.org] Part time at a Whole Foods and you are not living alone, so they'll want to count your household income, which is probably at least $25-$30k. The subsidies pretty much disappear after $40k/family of 2.

      It's a bit hard to get actual rates, but a google search pegs th

      • by pauljlucas ( 529435 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @07:18PM (#59192456) Homepage Journal

        It's also why Bernie's so popular with Young people. He's the only one we can count on to fix that broken law once and for all.

        Not as long as obstructionist republicans, e.g., McConnel, control either house of Congress that won't ever pass any kind of sensible law to get to Bernie's desk for his signature.

        • given the bully pulpit of the presidency and the will to use it head on (and for something other then twitter fights) he can rally the American people behind him, just as FDR did before.

          Bernie is the second coming of FDR. Full Stop.
      • "$8k deductible"

        That's what really really blows about Obamacare. You pay extortionate insurance premiums, and YOU STILL DON'T HAVE ACCESS TO HEALTHCARE. Obamacare is a cruel bad joke.

        • over what it replaced. Before Obamacare 70,000 people died of treatable illness every year. Obamacare cut that number in half, which sounds good until you realize 35,000 Americans die of treatable illness every year.

          There's a mother campaigning for Bernie. Her daughter had insurance but the paper work wasn't in order. The hospital sent her home to get it sorted out. Wallet Biopsy. She had a blood clot. She died.
          • "Obamacare cut that number in half"

            Any citation for that? I searched it a bit and found no clear answer.

            Vox ran a surprisingly fair and coherent opinion-news piece discussing the shortcomings of various techniques used to study this question. Tho of course concluding (without particularly compelling evidence) that Obamacare had a beneficial impact. Big Brother Google promoted this result above all others.
            https://www.vox.com/policy-and... [vox.com]

            Meanwhile the capitalist stooges over at Forbes point out that in 2015

      • The only thing concrete we got out of it was kids until 26 and pre-existing condition coverage.

        To a non-American that does not have multiple insurers throughout their life, that pre-existing condition coverage seems pretty huge.

        "You might have been sick before you joined our policy". Say what!?

  • by ErichTheRed ( 39327 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @04:51PM (#59192032)

    Amazon is famous for being a stingy employer. Everyone I've talked with who worked there in the tech side of the house (AWS, etc.) describes a ruthless cost-saving culture. This just sounds like they got to Item #402 on the to-do list after the Whole Foods acquisition...some clueless MBA saw a number on a spreadsheet and instructed one of the minions to make it go away.

    There is no excuse whatsoever for wealthy companies (who pay no taxes on top of all that) to not offer benefits to employees. Part time or not, they can afford it...all businesses can because it's a further tax write-off.

    • Re:Not shocked (Score:5, Insightful)

      by alvinrod ( 889928 ) on Friday September 13, 2019 @05:08PM (#59192084)
      Amazon can afford it right up until their customers go to other stores with lower prices. If people cared at all about how well employees get treated at some place they shop, we never would have outsourced our manufacturing and "Buy American" would be more than just an empty slogan. Also, Amazon is wealthy because of their core business, not because of Whole Foods. Grocery stores operate on some of the slimmest margins out of all businesses and while you can make money with a grocery store (people are always going to have to eat) you won't get rich, at least not in the same way you would with a software company.
      • "right up until their customers go to other stores with lower prices."

        99.9% of other grocery stores have lower prices than Whole Foods. Yet somehow WF still has customers. Hmmmm....

  • Costco does this too, at least their food demo subsidiary does.

    I believe most, if not all, of the dollar-store clones do this too.

    And I think Walmart does it to some extent too.

    It's a classic move. Employ only part-time workers to get out of providing any benefits what-so-ever.

    Welcome to America. Where a person can work 80 hours a week and get no benefits (working multiple part-time jobs.)

    Where finding an actual full-time position is next to impossible for the less educated among us. And this is why.

    Why

    • Did you miss the part where only 2% of their workforce are part timers affected by this change? How is 1900/95000 employees an example of "employ only part-time workers to get out of providing any benefits what-so-ever," exactly?

    • part time workers are great for flexibility. You bring them in when they're needed and send them home when they're not. The savings are huge.
  • Given 'em a break. Bezos needs more money for more dildo shaped rockets
  • Jeff needs a bigger yacht

    • Well, let’s face it - when you look like Elmer Fudd, the only sure way to get women is ostentatious displays of wealth.

  • Whole Foods was built on whole bullshit IMO. Nothing else matters except that. People who shop at Whole Foods are gullible saps getting ripped off. And, as always: Fuck Apple
  • Remember, Whole Foods was purchased by Amazon. This is just another case of the richest man on the planet getting richer off the backs of workers. Because, clearly, Bezos needs more money.
    Workers wages stagnate, benefits get plundered, and the oligarchy have more now then anytime in modern history.
  • Psst, you don't really get to keep your doctor. You get to choose a doctor they already decided you can have. Union plans are the same, except usually there's more latitude with whom you can actually choose.

    We need to stop this employer decided care crap with job lock-in. Charge them the tax since they buy it anyway or stop the tax breaks and it will end real quick. Then we can move on to real private plans chosen by the individual or government plan if that is your choice. Subsidized appropriately individu

  • I have no problem not shopping at Whole Foods. None at all.

    The local groceries (and one of the big national chains) here are all union shops and/or provide health care to ALL workers, including the guy who collects shopping carts in the parking lot. So as long as I have choices, I will exercise them.

  • That should be threshold. Then Amazon can also pay them at a lower rate, because the cost of paying for 100 hours will be too high.

  • You can make all the jokes you want about Whole Foods, but Bezos is going to wreck it.
  • The Republicans have a great health plan coming out any day now.
  • Another example of the Bottom Line being taken over what's best for employees.
    Well, if universal health care becomes a thing, then this should be irrelevant in the near future.

We are each entitled to our own opinion, but no one is entitled to his own facts. -- Patrick Moynihan

Working...